



Noticed any increase in food prices yet?



Lucio Machado picks Golden Delicious apples in a Washington orchard.  Goodfruit.com

Lucio Machado picks Golden Delicious apples in a Washington orchard. Goodfruit.com





The Wall Street Journal reported:






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How’s that applesauce?


7 Responses to Here’s a fine kettle of apples you’ve gotten us into . . . cheapskate

  1. […] The post in which the comments got me thinking about this song, about the farm disaster in apples in 2012 (oddly, a bumper crop in a few places cannot stave off higher prices and disaster elsewhere); see comments with two Woody Guthrie songs […]


  2. Ellie says:

    Ed, the Gina Rinehart who thinks people should be willing to work for $2 a day? She’d get along with today’s Teapublicans.


  3. JamesK says:

    hm, apparently Gina Rinehart owns apple orchards in the US.

    Would any conservative here like to explain why a business should be allowed to pay such pissante poor wages?


  4. Ed Darrell says:

    I thought that, too — it’s a tribute to the skills of these guys that they can make any money at all. You make the point Cesar Chavez kept trying to make, about grapes, and all other produce in the west.

    “Is this the best way we can grow our big orchards?” Woody Guthrie sang. Helluva question. Same question in “Pastures of Plenty.”

    Arlo and Emmy Lou with “Plane Wreck at Los Gatos Canyon”

    Pete with “Pastures of Plenty”


  5. Pangolin says:

    This isn’t going to be popular but if the pay for picking 1,000 lbs of apples is only $24 then it’s no goddamn wonder that they can’t find pickers. I’m not going to shift 1,000 lbs of anything for $24 and that goes triple for having to do that in a field far from home.

    What is that per pound? A whole 2.4 cents? For apples that retail at $1.50/lb? They could double the pickers pay and it would be a whole 5 cents a pound picking costs. If you’re not seeing apples in the stores because we can’t pay pickers five cents a pound don’t blame the pickers. That’s only 3% of retail costs something most shopping carts loaded with chips and soda wouldn’t even notice.




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